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Underground > Policy & Help >

Techniques for treating threadrot/member conflict

14:40 / 17.07.07

How can a moderator best keep a thread from unravelling into threadrot, especially the stripe of threadrot that is a conflict between members within the thread? Can confrontations between members be disarmed with moderator help/intervention/humor? Should threads be locked until such time as cooler heads prevail?

The reason I ask is...I've witnessed a few cogent threads being derailed by one bit of snark made against another member, which immediately breaks out into a cartoonish brawl of words. It ends up being a waste of time and of the thread's intended purpose.

ONLY NICE THINGS

14:58 / 17.07.07

Since you are a moderator, and since removing moderator powers is an extremely long-winded process, one good start in assisting the thread is not to insult any of the parties in your "let's get ontopic" post. This is very rarely successful. This is why your contribution so far to the "Ratatouille" thread is bad and partisan moderation, if moderation it claims to be.

Another way to do it is:

1) State clearly that the threadrot is now out of hand.
2) State that regardless of the rights and wrongs of this, it is now damaging to the thread.
3) State further that therefore any further comments that do not address the subject of the thread will be moved for deletion.

As it is, by putting on the mod hat here after taking a partisan shot there, you've rather damaged your credibility. You can behave as poster or moderator, but trying to flip between the two in a single case makes it less likely that you will be able to effect any positive change within the thread.

15:46 / 17.07.07

PMing the parties involved, might be a better idea than an in-thread mention. That's worked - in both directions - for me. Seems more civil, and no worry of appearing to be trying to polarize the board or run anyone down, letting the thing be dropped quietly.

Jawsus-son Starship

15:47 / 17.07.07

Since you are a moderator, and since removing moderator powers is an extremely long-winded process, one good start in asisting the thread is not to insult any of the parties in your "let's get ontopic" post. This is very rarely successful. This is why your contribution so far to the "Ratatouille" thread is bad and partisan moderation.

Another way to do it is:

1) State clearly that the threadrot is now out of hand.
2) State that regardless of the rights and wrongs of this, it is now damaging to the thread.
3) State further that therefore any further comments that do not address the subject of the thread will be moved for deletion.

As it is, by putting on the mod hat here after taking a partisan shot there, you've rather damaged your credibility. You can behave as poster or moderator, but trying to flip between the two in a single case makes it less likely that you will be able to effect any positive change within the thread.

Because you didn't do that, no, you'd never do that. And certainly not in the same thread! Haus, seriously, I believe the term is Pot/Kettle/Black - you can arrange as according.

16:03 / 17.07.07

I disagree Mathelete, Haus does a pretty great job of seperating his mod hat from his heated debate mode. Sure you might feel the icy chill winds of the Outer Wastes swirling in when he calls someone on their shit but I've never seen him abuse his mod status. Is it that his tone of disapproval sounds the same sometimes? He does have a distinct manner of posting.

If you want to call a mod out for problematic behavior please provide links to posts.

ONLY NICE THINGS

16:05 / 17.07.07

Mathlete, I believe you said:

I will, as I have before, leave any Policy threads that aren't A) about me or something I was involved in, or B) about bannings and such.

This was in response to my suggestion that you would make people far less irritated and less likely to propose banning you if you stayed out of the Policy altogether. I think you might have some impulse control issues here which you need to address and which I would rather not encourage.

ONLY NICE THINGS

17:38 / 17.07.07

Alas, I just lost a post on this topic, and addressing your comment above, XK.

However, I'm not entirely sure where one goes with this - the last time Hieronymus started a thread, very like this one in fact, in Policy it was a result of his behaviour here, and after the first post he never returned to it. So, I'm not sure whether this thread is intended to be a discussion, or simply a sort of venting of steam.

This latest incident originates in Nico's threadrot of "Ratatouille", culminating in this post, where ze has been goaded into saying something somewhat ontopic, but has surrounded it with trollery, here. This Policy thread was started after Hieronymus got involved with this contribution, here, not actually talking about Ratatouille at all.

Also in this thread we find an immediate and useful answer, when Gourami, Decadent Nightfalling and I all ignore Hieronymus' abusive tone and content, and instead focus on the actual, thread-relevant content that preceded it - content generated by myself that he referenced only by saying:

While the attempt to bring more content to the table is appreciated, it's blown to smithereens by your sniping first paragraph.

Apparently it was not. So, essentially, the best answer to the question:

How can a moderator best keep a thread from unravelling into threadrot, especially the stripe of threadrot that is a conflict between members within the thread?

Is, in this case, "don't flame". Failing that, the second answer is "ignore flames". The first we did not manage, the second we largely did, presumably hence this thread. If neither of those works, I think one might have to start acting as a moderator, which may involve acknowledging and accepting responsibility for any part one might have played in the run-up to the disruption - recusing one's previous involvement, in effect - or acknowledging one's personal unsuitability to peacemake, and asking a friend, depending on whether or not one has succumbed to the temptation to throw the odd punch oneself.

20:15 / 17.07.07

Hieronymus, I think that there is no single best way to deal with anything. As far as I can tell, moderators are unpaid janitors who get treated like they're the world's most evil and powerful despots when their only 'power' is the power to take out the garbage. Slowly. And only if other people agree to help them. So I'm not sure there's very much you can do, as a mod. Perhaps you could restate applicable policy or board etiquette in a brief line or two and then try to move the conversation forward in the hopes that the flame/topical content ratio can be improved?

06:32 / 18.07.07

Or one of the parties could try and take the problem to PM and attempt to keep it there. It remains to be seen how successful that will be.

ONLY NICE THINGS

07:09 / 18.07.07

Oh, Nico. You're not very good at this, are you?

If you want to send a rude PM, and hope that the other party will adhere to general PM protocol and not share its content with the board and thus make you look like... well, like someone who has deciding to start sending rude PMs, the thing not to do, if you realise that it might not make you look terribly good to be sending insults through the PM system, is then to try to use moral blackmail by talking on the open board about how you are sending PMs. You see, if you do that it makes the discussion public. You have brought it into the public domain by referencing it here. Poor technique.

08:55 / 18.07.07

If you think you're going to goad me into taking this any further, think again. I'm done. This, at the very least, is definitely not the place for it. At any rate, I'm not going to continue it anywhere else; PM's or otherwise. I posted that in order to head you off at the pass, so to speak, regarding your earlier 'threat' to post the PM's I sent you on the general board.

If you're that desperate to make yourself look like an immature, petty ass in an attempt to score points or whatever, be my guest. Don't expect me to participate though. As I said, I'm done with this crap.

ONLY NICE THINGS

09:08 / 18.07.07

I posted that in order to head you off at the pass, so to speak, regarding your earlier 'threat' to post the PM's I sent you on the general board.

Yes, I think I just said that.

If you want to send a rude PM, and hope that the other party will adhere to general PM protocol and not share its content with the board and thus make you look like... well, like someone who has decided to start sending rude PMs, the thing not to do, if you realise that it might not make you look terribly good to be sending insults through the PM system, is then to try to use moral blackmail by talking on the open board about how you are sending PMs.

I do wish you'd read things, Nico.

It was not a threat, however, but a question. Again, I do wish you'd read things. My exact words were:

I'd like to reproduce your PM on the open board. {Reference to one of the insults contained therein excised}. I assume you won't mind, as long as I don't do it in the Ratatouille thread?

Since you have yet to add any value to this thread or my PM inbox, it might certainly be best if you stopped contributing to them. I hope that the next time you do contribute to a thread you will be able to do better.